God Howls With Laughter At Earthly Plans,

I Have Sparred With Commenters As A Music Writer (on The Rumpus, Among Other Places, See E.g., My Review About Taylor Swift), And That Was Plenty Of Training!

Have I Mentioned That I Expect Death Around Every Turn, That Every Blue Sky Has A Safe Sailing Out Of It, That Every Bus Runs Me Over, That Every Low, Mean Syllable Uttered In My Direction Seems To Intimate The Violence Of Murder, That Every Family Seems Like An Opportunity For Ruin And Every Marriage A Ceremony Into Which Calamity Will Fall And Hearts Will Be Broken And Lives Destroyed And People Branded By The Mortifications Of Love?

I Suppose That The Sympathetic/unsympathetic Debate About Characters Sometimes Feels To Me Like A Misstatement Of Purpose. I Always Think Of Truly Complex Characters Are Falling Between The Cracks In That Debate.

I'm Trying To Make Sure That There's Comedy As Well As Sadness. It Makes The Sadness More Memorable.

Updike Worked This Way, And I Just Kinda Borrowed It From Him. So The Memoir Will Be Relief From Novel Writing For A Moment.